Be Alright
by Leashy
Summary: Angst angst angst. In Character E+C. Look ma, no slash! [complete]


This is the first In Character fic I've ever actually finished and although it's IC, it's slightly AU. Major angst. Set a little in the future. I don't own Edge, Christian or Jericho. Lyrics are to Sweetbox's 'Everything's Gonna be Alright' and I don't own that either. This is for my brother and wherever he is, I hope he knows I love him in spite of everything. Take care of yourself, bro.  
  
~~~  
  
/Everything's gonna be alright  
  
Everything's gonna be alright  
  
Whoever thought the sun would come crashing down  
  
My life in flames  
  
My tears complete the pain  
  
We fear the end, the dark as deep as river bed  
  
My book of life incomplete without you here  
  
Alone I sit and reminisce  
  
Sometimes I miss your touch  
  
Your kiss, your smile  
  
And meanwhile you know I never cry  
  
'Cause deep down inside you know our love will never ever die/  
  
Come on, Edge. I know you can beat this. You're not going to lie here forever. I won't let you. You have to wake up. Please, Edge, please. I love you, bro. Please wake up. When I heard about your accident, I had just finished yet another successful tag match with Chris Jericho. Life was going good for me. I didn't have you to worry about. I was happy. I thought nothing could bring me down again. How wrong was I? I don't remember who told me, or even how they told me. I just remember hearing it and then someone sitting me in front of a small screen where I saw it.   
  
It should have been an easy move. A spear. How many times have you done that move on me, huh, bro? In the ring, when we were practising, when we were kids messing around, when I was heading for the bathroom for something to tear myself apart with. It should have been so fucking easy, but I could see in your movements that your neck was troubling you. Someone had mentioned a couple of weeks ago that you were back from that neck injury earlier than expected, but I ignored it, just as I've ignored everything to do with you for so long.  
  
I know now that I shouldn't have ignored it. I should have tried to do something. From the start of the clip that I watched, it was clear that something was wrong with you.  
  
And from the second I saw you crash into the mat headfirst and go out cold, something's been wrong with me.  
  
So here I am, sitting at your hospital bed, watching machines breathe for you, watching machines make your heart keep beating, watching the drip full of saline and whatever other fluids pour slowly into your body via your arm.  
  
Shit, Edge I miss you so much. I can't understand it. I mean, we always fought the way all brothers fight but I really thought that I hated you now. I thought that I would never need anything from you again.  
  
But I don't hate you. And the one thing I need from you right now is for you to wake the fuck up. ...Damn it, Edge, why won't you wake up?  
  
What the hell do you want me to do? Is this some kind of punishment? Wake up, you bastard. I miss you. I love you, okay? God damn it, Edge, now I'm crying. I don't fucking cry for nobody. Especially not for you. You'll never know what it was like, watching you crash down into that mat. I felt like fire was spreading through my lungs and my gut. Like the flames you get from drinking good quality whisky only this wasn't a nice, comforting burn. No, this was horrible. This was painful. This tore through me and scared me stiff.  
  
I think in truth that I've missed you since the split. And I know why it's taken this to make me realise. Yeah, I know the exact reason. I'm a stubborn jackass, Edge. I'm stubborn and stupid and I always think I'm right. I know. I know I must have hurt you and I'm SORRY. I'm so sorry. Wake up?  
  
Please, bro? Just wake up? Everything's going to be cool again. We'll go back to how it was, Edge and Christian against the world and I won't care if you're better than me, I won't get jealous, I won't be fucked up, I promise. Anything, bro. Just wake up.   
  
I love you, Edge. I'll love you forever. I just want you to wake up so you can see me telling you.   
  
/Everything's gonna be alright (yeah)  
  
Everything's gonna be OK (no doubt)  
  
Everything's gonna be alright  
  
Together we can take this one day at a time  
  
Can you take my breath away? (yeah)  
  
Can you give him life today? (no doubt)  
  
Is everything gonna be OK?  
  
I'll be your strength  
  
I'll be here when you wake up  
  
Take your time  
  
And I'll be here when you wake up (uh huh)/  
  
I'm waiting for you, bro. I'm right here by your hospital bed and wild horses wouldn't drag me away. I'm not going anywhere until you wake up. Chris turned up earlier. I think he was shocked to see my tears. He tried to get me to leave for some reason. I think it was just to get a cup of coffee but I wouldn't. See? See, Edge? This is how it's going to be. I'm staying right here until you're better. And then, when you are, we're going to sort this whole mess out.  
  
All those petty squabbles that I caused because hey, I'm Christian, I can't deal with life, they're all over. All the drinking to forget who I am, that's gone too. I swear, if you wake up, I'll never drink again. I'll never do anything that's bad for me or bad for us. I won't keep you up nights worrying about where I am and what messes I'm getting myself into.  
  
For once in my life, Edge, I'm going to be here for you. You've always been there for me, even when I was so cruel, when I told you to leave, told you I hated you. Even then, you were there. Even when I was clawing and kicking at you, you wouldn't let go of me. That's going to change. From here on in, I'll be the strong one if that's what you need me to be. If you have to give up wrestling, I'll be right by you side. We'll sell our places in Florida and we'll go home. Not to mom and dad, we'll find somewhere we can live by ourselves and I'll rebuild every single one of those bridges that I burned.  
  
I hate seeing those machines they've got you hooked up to, Edge. I mean, I know they're keeping you alive and all, but they just look so wrong. Someone like you, someone whose smile can light up the whole world, someone with such energy and vitality should never have to rely on machines to keep you alive. I would gladly take their job. I would give anything to go back to the days when we lived for one another, when you were what kept me sane and I was what kept you going.   
  
If I had to pick, Edge, I'd pick you. You know what I'm talking about. A conversation we had with some of the guys way back in the day about who we would pick to survive something. I would pick you. I would always pick you. You're my brother and I love you and I'd rather die knowing that you were still alive, that your smile was still lighting up the world than go on in this world with you dead.  
  
/I never thought my heart would miss your simple beat  
  
Caress your hand as I watch you while you sleep  
  
So sweet  
  
I weep as I search within  
  
To find a cure to bring you back again  
  
And the sun will rise  
  
Open up your eyes  
  
Surprise just a blink  
  
Of an eye  
  
I try, I try to be positive  
  
You're a fighter so fight  
  
Wake up and live/  
  
I don't know how long I've been here now, Edge. I've lost count of the days. Maybe I should carve little lines into the wall like people do in prisons. But that would mean turning away from you unnecessarily. Despite what I said at the start, I have left a couple of times. But it was only to go to the bathroom or get a coffee. I've been so adamant to stay that the nurses finally relented and set up a little cot for me to sleep in. So here I am, sitting by your side, holding your hand, willing you to wake up.  
  
I've bugged the doctors and nurses constantly, asking when you're going to wake up, demanding to know what drugs they're giving, what will make you wake up, what will bring you back from wherever you are right now. Because wherever you are, you're not meant to be there. You're meant to be here. With me.   
  
I had a dream the other night. I dreamed that I was sitting by your hospital bed, staring down at you and as I watched, you blinked. That was all because the next thing I knew, I was awake, the little light above your bed clicked on and I was staring down at you, waiting for the blink that never came. That devastated me, Edge. I really thought that this waiting might be over when I had that dream. I thought that finally, finally, you'd come back to me. But no.  
  
I'm trying so hard not to just give in and admit to myself that you're gone. Gone so far back into your own mind that you can't ever come back. I hope it's nice where you are, Edge. But at the same time, I hope it's shitty enough to make you want to leave. Because maybe if where you are isn't great, it might inspire you to fight your way back. I know you can do it.  
  
You've always been the strongest one out of us; my own mental state over the years has been a testament to that. Not just emotionally, but physically, you've always been stronger than me. I believe that you can beat this, even if you don't know it. You've spent almost all of your life fighting for me. Whether it was against the bigger kids at school who ragged on me or against myself when one thing or another triggered my internal self-destruct button, you were always fighting for me, even when it was against me. All I'm asking, Edge, is for one last fight. For you to kick and holler and punch and cuss your way out of there, right back to me.  
  
/Everything's gonna be alright  
  
(I'll wait a lifetime)  
  
I'd give my life to only see you breathe again  
  
Hand in hand as we walk on the white sands  
  
To hear your voice  
  
Rejoice as you rise and say  
  
This is the day that I wake pray OK  
  
Today's silence as time just moves on  
  
You can't hear it though  
  
But I'm playing our favourite songs  
  
I miss you much  
  
I wish you'd come back to me  
  
You see I'll wait a lifetime  
  
'Cause you're my destiny/  
  
Today's the day, Edge. It should be more...momentous, I suppose. But no. It's just another day. Through the windows, what I can see of the sky is a uniform shade of pale blue, a few white clouds straggling their way across it. I remember when our grandma died and we were in the back yard, crying and holding tight to one another. You were only a kid, same as me, but you told me grandma was on a cloud, going to heaven. I wonder if you actually believed that and I wonder if it's true. Maybe if I look real hard, I'll see you on one of those clouds, your smile brightening up the world for the last time. Because you know what? Today is the last fucking chance for you, asshole. If you don't wake up within in the next twenty minutes or so, you never will.  
  
The doctors have told me time and again that you're brain dead, that you've got no chance. If it was up to me, I'd go on ignoring them the way I have from the start. But it's not up to me. In the event that something like this would happen, you signed over the responsibility of deciding what should happen to our parents. I held them off for as long as I could, Edge. I really did. I told them time and time again that I knew you would wake up soon, I just knew it.  
  
But I guess they trust the doctors more than they trust me. So today's the day when they flip the switch on their golden boy and stop all of the machines. I'm sure you'll forgive me for not being there when it happens, Edge. If it's any consolation, our CD will be playing when they do it.  
  
Remember when we made those CDs? After weeks of cursing, I finally figured out how to work a CD burner and we spent god only knew how long downloading all of our favourite songs. We wrote numbers on scraps of paper and picked them at random to decide the order. We burnt one copy each.  
  
After we split, I considered throwing it away in a childish fit of rage, a foolhardy attempt to make a statement. I thought you had destroyed your copy. But no. It was in your kit bag all the time, just waiting to be listened to. So here we are. Listening to those songs that we used to get drunk to, cry to, air-guitar to, wrestle to. This is the last chance, Edge.   
  
I can hear their footsteps coming down the hall now. I wish it didn't have to be this way. Edge, bro, God, please... Asking you to wake up hasn't worked so here's another request. Wherever you go after this, don't let it be too far away from me. I can't bear to think what it'll be like if I can't even sense you near me again. Please, whatever happens to your body, let your soul come and find me.  
  
I have to go now, Edge. I can't watch this. I'll leave the CD on. I don't want to be apart from you for the rest of my life, but if that's what it takes to spend eternity with you, my brother, the other half of my soul, then so be it.  
  
I know you're going to heaven, bro. God would be a fool not to welcome an angel like you. But don't go too far in, will you? I'm going to try so hard, Edge. I'm going to be as good as I can possibly be and I'm gonna get to heaven.  
  
For you, bro. All for you.  
  
~~~ 


End file.
